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Also consider, if you're having jealous reactions when M admits she's seeing somebody, it's probably scaring her out of admitting the truth. Not that this excuses her dishonesty, but it partially helps explain it. It should also give you hope that as you get a better handle on that jealousy (and you're already doing that), she'll probably become less afraid to tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

__________________Love means never having to say, "Put down that meat cleaver!"

I did the TEA exercises, and they worked! I was really good, M noticed it - "it's like when we first met again", my friends noticed it "you're a lot more upbeat lately" and my marks noticed it - straight A's. What was most important of course is that I noticed it. I really began to feel good, but a large part of that hinged on the fact M was happy, and we were getting time together. This is a primary purpose for many men, to make their woman happy, it was working, I was ecstatic.

Now the confession bit. Work piled up and up at university and M's workload was a freakin nightmare, mine was 3/4 of hers and 14 hour days were the norm. We barely got any time, but it was ok. For weeks we barely got any time together. I missed her bad, saw her briefly at school, quick sex and she's off again bout once a week, things to be grateful for. I began to feel sad again, lonely, unloved. YUK. I knew that TEA works, but had stopped using it for about a month. WHY?? I knew my thinking was going wrong and I needed to do something (TEA) but for some stupid reason I was resistant to helping myself and began to slide.

I brought up my insecurities and other head crap with M several times in the past fortnight. When M announced she was spending her birthday away I tried to be cooperative but I wasn't and pretty much gave her a guilt trip.

So, here I am, checking in, an unfinished story. Why I returned to this self-destructive behaviour I don't know. I do know it's time to admit that I should never have stopped the TEA (as it works - for me) and I need to make it a regular part of my schedule as when the pressure is on I can revert back to idiot in short order.

All my unhappiness is about fear - I am not good enough, thus, I will always be alone. BUT! M has said - I will always come back to you. I will go overseas working and on holiday, I will go see him, but I will always come back. Why am I so sad. If I had 100% of a womans time - I would ask for less! - some ME time for me, surely! The time she leaves to be with him I am at my most vulnerable, this is where I needed her support, but I had not been supportive, so what did I expect.

I chose to accept her polyamory, but I let myself slide back into the angst and crap. I've been TEA again for 2 days, still dark in my head but it's bearable. It took 2-3 days last time for the raw edge to get rasped off using TEA.

That's another thing. This time she left, we were not on a good foot. Yet I was nowhere near as down as last time, and the first time - suicidal, medicated. There is certainly a lot of improvement.

The problem then is not so much the polyamory today, but me using emotional leverage to make her feel bad as I have been wallowing in it, then us being apart on bad terms after a long period of having very little time.

Yes stress and workload have certainly played their part, and luckily this has been acknowledged by both parties.

Today we got an hour or so and got to talk. I still get to see her but I'm in the dogbox. There's only so much of a stupid behaviour one can take, and so I have been challenged, and she is correct:

a) I am too intense

b) I need to stop obsessing over her and take control of my life.

Both are fair. I find it very hard not to obsess over M. I am head over heels but it's worse than that, I'm also constantly thinking of her, analysing what she says (not what I'm thinking eg TEA), and I get frantic with worry when I've not seen her for a few days.

Not good.

The steps I've taken to get a life of my own (activities not including M) are positive, but slow moving. Am getting back on stage, which also gives me a social life and fun circle to hang out with. Am getting a vehicle (not immediately but soon) so I can go visit, go do shows, generally stop sitting here hoping M will arrive.

Obsession, I hate it. Anyone with experience in removing the obsession and retaining the love? I'll keep doing TEA, I was getting better, right now I'm a bit insecure, unsure, afraid.

TEA

Thoughts: I can't stop obsessing.

Errors: Extreme thinking. Jumping to conclusions.

Analysis/rant: If I stopped obsessing I would actually be a lot happier than when I am. Obsessive thoughts are poison, they freeze me out of activities I should be doing, and self perpetuate paranoia and falsities. I think I obsess as I feel I have no control (correct) over M, and when I am angsty she pushes me away, then i get worse, she gets worse, stupid circle! As I am the one who is into all this analysis, and have seen where this destructive behaviour gets me, I am the one who needs to change, and this will break the whole cycle.

I am so afraid of going back to the dark despair I felt in the past that I obsess over avoiding it, and nearly bring it upon myself in the process. I can stop obsessing over M by replacing that wasted time with things that truly make me happy (M not included). Getting on stage and being funny, getting on stage and reading (funny) poems. Going to parties with friends and getting liquored up. Hiking, weight training... I can also stop obsessing by regularly (DAILY) TEA exercises to work some of the madness out. This exercise exposes madness to the light of day, and when it is identified as rubbish, has much less power over me.

My obsession is me trying to avoid pain, and it is backfiring. I can stop obsessing, it is a matter of self preservation to do so.

Well, I think it's only natural to worry about the future. Most of us do it. Bad things can happen in the future. But if you agonize over it too much, you kind of rob yourself of the happiness you could have enjoyed here in the present. Not to mention a whole lot of the bad events you fear/anticipate in the future may never come to pass. The only exception would be when you got so hung up with "doom and gloom," that it caused you to act as if all the bad stuff was already happening, and that can make M feel pushed away. So try to avoid that part of the vicious cycle.

You'll definitely benefit from having things to do that you enjoy while M is away. Something so it doesn't have to be "scary to be left alone with your own thoughts." Your thoughts are trying to scare you. Shoo them away with TEA exercises, visits with friends, and fun stuff that you like to do. Then you won't be in "freak-out mode" when M shows up; you'll be in a healthy/positive frame of mind. Above all, seek to appreciate and enjoy what you have right here and now, rather than agonizing over all the many things that could go wrong tomorrow. You couldn't possibly cover everything that could go wrong, and in the meantime you're missing out on the hopeful feelings about the many things that could go well tomorrow.

If there's anything you can do to prepare for the future, that's a good idea because it might mean better odds of things going better. Just don't obsess so much about preparing for the future that you actually barricade yourself against the future, both good and bad scenarios. When preparing for the future, prepare yourself to receive the good things that will happen as well.

More practice and thinking will get you in a little better cycle, as time goes on. I think that's something to look forward to.

Sincerely,
Kevin T.

__________________Love means never having to say, "Put down that meat cleaver!"

The TEA has created rapid changes in my thinking, and subsequently feelings, again. I have made an appointment to see a counsellor to join a CBT group she might set me up with. CBT is the umbrella TEA belongs to. The stuff is working so well for me, I am intrigued, and would like to learn what other tools I might employ. TEA seems to allow me to face truths as I unravel layers of (rubbish) thoughts that obscure them. I think my resistance to continuing TEA may be a fear of change? Fear of no more excuses and gotta get off my butt and get on with it - no more pity party

I believe what I do (thinking) has a lot to do with time. I go time travelling in my head to solve problems... I think this is my broken self defense mechanism: I allow a portion of my past over which I had no real control (childhood, and later, jail) to dictate how I percieve the events of the present (powerless) and possible futures (powerless).

Of course, this is utter nonsense!

If I haven't shared the jail bit yet, I was a wild youth till 24. Kept getting caught for cannabis, got locked up with some real assholes. No butt rape just attacked a few times. Jail is soul destroying and for cannabis charges plain wrong. Long time ago, it wasn't all bad, and I'm ok

The trick to success (peace of mind in my case) in the face of adversity, is to just have the best day I can, one day at a time, wherever I was at. In that manner I am not powerless. When they locked me up I did what I could do. I wrote a book; got fit; learned to boil water for tea using a plastic spoon and some wire, and how to smuggle weed in my butt

The best I can do, one day at a time took me from unemployed ex con to stage and television work, travel, mates so talented you'd have heard of some of them, and now science, and coming into post graduate studies in ecology (love it!). I do have control, I am doing real well, now to become an expert in the ways of unconditional love - with boundaries hehe.

I have been feeling powerless as obsession renders me powerless, my thoughts preoccupied with M make me largely incapable of seeing the rest of the awesomeness that is my life, including her participation in it. Blinded by bullshit thinking and feeling powerless I try to control things out of my control.

M is a wonderful addition to my life and I to hers. The future cannot be foretold. The past is done. I can use bad experiences to interpret today or I can draw on the strength of character I have displayed again and again throughout my life. I am surrounded by love and wisdom, including here in this forum. I am not and need never be alone.

That's the spirit. You have the wisdom you need, you just need sufficient quiet of mind to tap into it. When you find you're getting wound up with anxiety, get a chance to take a break, sit, lay down, close your eyes, examine the racing thoughts. Let them race with you as an observer, until they start slowing down and you can analyze them. The rest is pretty much stuff you already know how to do.

We always have a circle of concern (things we'd like to change), and a circle of influence (things we *can* change. Stay focused on your circle of influence -- on that part of it that intersects the circle of concern. Things you can change, that you also want to change. Be at peace about the things you can't change. Rejoice in the progress and freedoms that you do have. Don't torture yourself with things that could supposedly go wrong with M. Instead, rejoice that you have M in your life, here and now. Don't let the goodness of this moment slip away.

Joining a CBT group sounds like a great idea.

__________________Love means never having to say, "Put down that meat cleaver!"

Thank you for the excellent feedback. It feels strange baring myself like this, but other members have done the same and helped me. Also, although sharing my thoughts is honesty, when the thoughts are exposed they are often absolute rubbish - the 'honesty' is falsified.

SO, which way is up?

I am so much better today than I have been in a long time. I'm almost myself again. Here I am sitting in my skin and enjoying my own company (and thoughts), I'm thinking about things I want to do (most of the time), and am producing a good deal of good work. I am concerned with issues of my own, exams, fitness, bad habits, stage work, raising finance. M is probably asleep right now amid a sprawl of 20 something bodies after a class party. Good for her, it's great blowing off steam, and cutting loose is hard to do in the presense of your partner. A part of me wants to complain, the part that tries to protect me and just drives me insane with worry and jealousy.

Thoughts: M got drunk and fucked someone last night, therefore, what we have is broken.

Errors: Jumping to conclusions. Ignoring the positive. And emotional blocking - a common error I have recognised in myself which I will now call - pity party - in which emotions are allowed to compromise my wellbeing and productivity - it is my faulty old self defense/warning system from faulty thinking. So!...

Analysis: I am jumping to conclusions, and even if M hooked up a drunk fuck, I am not losing her, or her love, the great sex, the friendship, none of it, unless I choose to be upset and think it's all about me and make her so miserable, and me so miserable, for what? Drunk sex? We're all human, just love her, besides, if she did, she'll beat herself up enough for both of us.

What we have is awesome, so awesome in fact that I have allowed myself to ignore so many other great things in my life and have limited myself severely in the process (and blamed M for my pity party). But life, love, happiness, and enjoyment need not have some kind of limit imposed on them. With balance each aspect of life might accentuate the other, with love for myself my love for life and others in it grows.

I am more afraid of an affair. Hah! There already is one, always has been. Thoughts old and tired. Polyamory means love is not limited, her love for others does not diminish her love for me.